


I'll Tell You My Sins (So You Can Sharpen Your Knife)

by dancer_of_the_hellfire_rumba



Category: Marvel Cinematic Universe, the winter soldier - Fandom
Genre: Angst, Betrayal, Canon-Typical Violence, F/M, Fighting and making up, Fights, Fluff, Fluff and Angst, Implied/Referenced Torture, Lies, Lots of Crying, Lots of it, Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder - PTSD, Steve's a brotherly figure in this, Vulnerability, reader is cool enough to ride a motorcycle
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-11-14
Updated: 2020-11-14
Packaged: 2021-03-10 00:27:05
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 8,445
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27565255
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/dancer_of_the_hellfire_rumba/pseuds/dancer_of_the_hellfire_rumba
Summary: Reader hides important information about herself and her past from both Steve (practically sibling) and Bucky (lover), causing serious damage to their relationship with her. When Bucky's severely, and likely fatally, hurt, the reader  tries to do what's right.
Relationships: James "Bucky" Barnes/Reader
Comments: 2
Kudos: 27





	I'll Tell You My Sins (So You Can Sharpen Your Knife)

**Author's Note:**

> @walkingaline on tumblr helped me edit this and I'm so grateful for her. She's the sweetest fuckin person.

It’s- vines, climbing up her organs, endless, crawling, and overflowing, thorns stuck inside her skin, digging in, and the breaths come shorter, clipped, chest weighted. There’s no alleviating this pressure, this overwhelming whirlwind of emotions, chaotic, heavy and filthy, slimy and awful.

The rumble of her engine, a loud interruption to her vicious thoughts, digging their claws inside her eyes, filling them with tears. The world is blurry, but the vibration- it's a welcome distraction. Familiar and strong, her motorcycle drives  _ her _ at this point, muscle memory leading to the Compound, tears flying off her face by the whipping wind.

She’s booking it. Time barely registers. It’s somewhere between lashing thoughts and trembling fingers that the off-white building rises between the trees, overwhelming and tall, glinting lights always on, no matter the time of night. Somewhere between gasping, fast breaths and stuttering heartbeats that she throws the bike to park and  _ runs _ , fast passes every lock with her ID and forgoes the elevator, knowing full well that the adrenaline thrumming in her veins will carry her up the stairs faster.

Shoes as if weighed by rocks, she feels slow, stuck in mud almost, liquid cement, sinking, drowning in quicksand as she rounds the corner and- Steve’s there, arms crossed over his chest, busted bottom lip pursed with his top one, a deep sigh swelling his chest. His hair is longer than the last time she saw him, he looks battered and bruised, and she’s known him for years- she can read his face clear as day. And as situations like this always have him, she knows, in the clench of his jaw, the statue-still set of his eyebrows, in his stony posture; he’s as worried as he is determined.

The phone call had been rushed.

She shouldn’t have heard it, about to jump in her shower, had she not forgotten her towel on her bed. Naked, feet padding on her plush rug, she digs in her bedside table for her usually silent device. It’s Steve, and she hasn’t heard from him in nearly a month and a half. Instantly she knows something isn’t right.

There’s only so many seconds it takes for the words to sink in, words like “mission went wrong”, and “hurt”, and “won’t make it”, and “ _ Bucky _ ”. Soon she’s pulling on clothes at lightning speed like the universe depends on it, shower be damned. Keys, jacket, helmet forgone, tears stream down her face as if she’s already lost him, bike kick-started because what else is there to do but  _ be there. _

And now? She’s here. And she feels foreign and bizarre, stepping in a space that she barely belongs in anymore. It’s sorta how she imagines entering an old house that’s now inhabited by new residents feels like- it feels the same, but in the same way it feels all too different, strange and foreign; revisiting an old life that’s been made into a new one for someone else.

It really doesn’t matter though, does it? Because she’s not here for herself- not for Fury, not Steve, not for the Avengers, or the missions. She’s here- she’s here for  _ him. _

Steps even slower now, approaching the Captain himself, very much aware of her knotted shoulders, her shaking hands. It’s evident, suddenly, in his posture that he knows she’s there. His shoulders stiffen just this bit more, and with a breath with which his chin raises a notch, he turns to see her. One foot behind the other, and he moves out the way, letting her in his spot in front of the window of the room  _ Bucky _ is in-

A gasp.

Time finally stops.

Unrecognizable. Buried under wounds and bruises, endless tubes- her lost boy, James,  _ Bucky _ . Tears fall at a new speed, and she allows this moment of vulnerability in front of Steve, allows herself to cover her mouth, her expression crumples, her tears flow freely, and- despite being mad at her, despite having patches to mend (if they can even be mended anymore), Steve is there, solid as always, with a hand on her shoulder, urging her in his arms. Old friendships die slowly, she thinks bitterly, and sinks in the comfort, eyes unable to be torn from the sight before her.

It takes some time, a good chunk of it, to compose herself, to part from Steve’s warmth and wipe the wetness off her cheeks. She wraps her arms around her front and shakes.

“We got ambushed,” he murmurs, and the statement is heavy. There’s guilt, sorrow, she’s sure it’s not fun to recall. “My fault. Didn’t know they were that many, must’ve had false info. Barely got to get him out of there.” She shudders. The image is loud and clear in her mind; Steve limping with the leg he’s currently not leaning on, busted and bleeding, carrying an unconscious Bucky, blood dripping from his mouth. She flinches.

“Can I-“ hesitation. A deep breath, shoulders squaring, remembering she no longer asks, she states. “I want to go in.” Steve stares for a second, calculating, thinking, looks back at Bucky, limp on the bed. He nods.

“Go.”

Before she knows it, the door shuts behind her slowly, an industrial, metal click, signifying a sealed door, nearly impenetrable if it was locked. She tries to be calm, but there’s no way, no reason to look composed either, so she flings herself to Bucky’s side, fingers twitching, hands hovering over him, afraid to touch him in case he frails like a burnt paper, in case he turns to dust and disappears before her very eyes.

Tears, once again, fall freely on her cheeks, tracing paths already carved by the previous breakdown, and the prospect of never seeing his wonderful crystal eyes, blue and loving, tears her apart. Worse so, the idea that the last time she saw them, they were red, hateful, betrayed, staring at her as if she was a monster, nothing more than the true scum of the earth, and he was  _ right,  _ and she will likely never be able to make everything right again.

It feels like claws are tearing at her chest like it’s low quality linen, destroying every tiny piece of her into infinitesimal other pieces and then tearing those too. There she is, now, nothing but rubble and ash, on the floor, limp and bleeding. Heart far too heavy for her chest, breaking again and again, her temples feel like they’re about to burst from the pressure.

Sitting on the chair next to his hospital bed, her fingers tremble, carefully sliding under Bucky’s still ones, holding his hand between hers gently, like a lifeline, leaning her forehead on it. She sits there, folded, crumpled, and she cries.

~

Y/n’s palms are red and kind of stingy, but she pulls her sleeves over them and keeps holding the scalding cup of coffee between her hands anyways. Eyes closed, she lets the steam warm her nose, lets the scent comfort her, and she imagines, with her headphones plugged in her ears, that she is elsewhere, in her apartment with Bucky, on the fire escape, watching the sun descend beneath the skyline of New York City. She imagines his arms around her waist, sitting between his legs with her own dangling off the metal landing and over the street. His voice, vibrating through his chest, onto her back, murmuring teasingly in her ear, nose buried in her hair and his warmth all around her. It’s peaceful, it’s soft and warm and everything she has ever wanted.

When her eyes open, she’s met with sky blue ones, not the ones she was just dreaming of, and she flinches, suddenly very happy her coffee cup has a lid over it.

Steve.

With a sigh, she takes a calming breath, and pulls her headphones out of her ears, tugged by the wire pinched between her fingers. She places them gently on the table in the cafeteria for guests and low-level agents in the compound. It’s nighttime, and the lights in the cafe make Steve’s hair look golden and glimmering.

“How’re you holding up?” She’s not sure how much he means that, and she knows he’s still very much mad at her for everything that’s happened between them. She knows, however, he’s also the one that called her to let her know about Bucky. She feels heavy.

“I can’t stop fuckin’ crying, if that’s what you’re asking,” she tells him, no care to maintain a strong persona, not in front of the person she used to consider her best friend until not so long ago. She flicks the edge of the lid of her beverage with the tip of her nail and looks up at him. Steve looks better than she does for sure. Not because he cares less, or because he’s slept at all, but because the serum gives him more stamina than her. He’s not as tired as she is, despite the hours he’s been awake for. Still, despite his enhanced powers, there’s purple bags under his eyes. “You?”

He doesn’t say anything, just looks at her with a small shake of his head, sighing deeply. She takes that as her answer. Despite wanting to fiddle with something, a way to prevent her hands from shaking, a nervous habit, she pushes her coffee cup towards him, a peace offering, something to hopefully bring him the comfort it brings her. Steve doesn’t touch it. She fiddles with her sleeves instead.

The cafeteria, despite being open twenty-four seven, is quiet. A blanket of silence falls over them and Y/n crosses one leg under the other just to have something to do, something instead of opening her mouth and ruining the temporary civility between them. The words bubble, climb over one another like beasts, up her throat, and threaten to spill- and there’s just so  _ much _ of them. So many apologies to make, so many explanations to offer, so many  _ please let’s just go back to how we were  _ ’s, so many _ this is killing me _ ’s, so many _ I can’t bear the thought of losing him without at least saying I’m sorry one last time. I don’t want that to happen with you too _ ’s _.  _ It’s all clogging the back of her throat like a spoonful of thick syrup that just won’t go down.

The idea that this might happen with Steve one day too overwhelms her. Two of the people she had found family in now hate her. She can’t let this happen with him, can’t lose him without telling him all of it. The realization; it’s the drop that makes the glass overflow. What if- what if tomorrow, or a month from now it’s Steve on that bed, Steve dying, what if she doesn’t get to tell him all of it? Never gets to apologize? How will she ever forgive herself for the things she didn’t say?

Her eyes well again. Her tongue feels like lead. It’s time.

“I…” She can’t bear to look at him. “Steve, I’m…” a shiver runs violently through her spine. “I’m so sorry. For all of it. I’m sorry.”

“I’m not Bucky, Y/n.” It’s like a kick in the stomach. She hears what he’s saying.  _ I can’t forgive you for both of us. _ It almost sounds like  _ your apology is useless. _

“Well it’s not just Bucky I need to apologize to.” She looks up at him, and she wills the tears to be held at bay, matching his intensity with her gaze. She clenches her fists, fingernails digging in her skin just to distract part of her brain, to feel less numb. “Do you want to hear the truth?” Steve watches her. His irises bounce between hers, they do a once over of her stance, and she knows how small she looks in her seat, in contrast to him, who, despite his frame of mind, always makes a room smaller just by being in it.

His expression is grim, as he nods seriously. She takes a deep breath.

“This is the truth.”

~~

The older she grows, Y/n keeps thinking that she’s experienced everything there is to. But it truly feels to her like she’s never experienced this kind of cold before. And it’s not- it’s not just external temperature. It’s icicles, lodged under her skin, brutally freezing, causing her to endlessly shudder, tremble like a leaf out in the winter, causing her jaw to lock, her limbs to knot up.

She walks and walks, a woman with a purpose, head held high, as high as a prisoner can hold it and- something really isn’t right with this morning. Something isn’t right, and she can tell because this morning she- she felt something she hasn’t felt in years, something she thought she’d never again feel, a bubble of emotion she truly believed they had snuffed out in her. But it becomes an itch, an itch she can’t seem to scratch, something she can’t exactly put words to, can’t name.

The more she walks, the more the feeling of dread climbs up her throat. This she’s familiar with;  _ fear.  _ Cold and fear, clouding her senses, paralyzing her, as Müller’s door raises in front of her, and she struggles to remind herself to keep walking, keep  _ breathing _ , one foot in front of the other, inhale, exhale, calm down. There’s no way to escape this anyways.

Director Müller was as tall as his voice was shrill and loud. His features were sharp, glass-cutting cheekbones and dimples that showed far too often. His hair was strawberry blonde and his eyes sunken, as if he was seventy years old with one foot in his grave. His skin looked taught over his bones. Always sharply dressed and always hiding about a dozen knives and pistols somewhere in his office. He liked Japanese jazz, had an affinity for yelling, and drank his whiskey straight. The only affection he’d ever had was reserved for his two small birds, Friedrich and Brigitta, whose singing he adored and who roamed in his office freely.

When he’d first kidnapped her and her older brother, Y/n sat doe eyed and watched as they beat her only sibling, her last relative left alive, to a pulp right in front of her. They didn’t know she had things to offer then. They did it for fun, a show of their capabilities, power play. They did it to break her into submission. When they found out, though, about her knowledge of science, her love for technology… That’s when her life truly ended.

She walks, now, down the freezing corridors, and knocks on Müller’s door three times.  _ Status report straight to me every four days _ , he’d muttered in sharp German way back when he’d first assigned her missions, back in the beginning, and true to his word, every four days, Y/n was forced to see the skin around his bony face tighten and stretch with another chilling smile.

“ _ Come in _ ,” he yells, and his awful voice bounces in the empty, concrete walls of the corridor. She hears his birds. The door creaks open loudly, metal as it is, and she quickly closes it behind her so that Friedrich and Brigitta won’t escape, something she’s learned to do over the years, after one particular incident no one likes to remember, never mind speak of. He calls her last name with lewd, slimy confidence, supposedly happy to see her, his rotten dimples making an appearance. She sits on one of his chairs, upon his prompting “How’s your assignment progressing?”

“Nicely, sir. I’ve reprogrammed the Chair and fixed previous faults.”

“See, Y/n…” He sits on the plush leather chair behind his desk, hands wringing together and as he says her name, he sits up, elbows on the arm rests. His long lashes and abyssal brown eyes examine her. “I think you’re not telling me the truth.”

“Uh…” Stance maintained, but lips pursed and hands just slightly trembling, she keeps his gaze. She can’t displease him. There’s no room for her failure. “I’m not sure what you’re talking about, sir. There’s… surely ways to improve, b-but the chair- it works well.”

“Ah, but that is not what I hear.” Müller stands up dramatically, rounds his desk with slow steps, and Friedrich starts chirping consistently, sensing the sudden tension in the room, loud, high pitch hurting her ears. She dares not flinch. The cold returns fiercely, heart climbing up to her throat, choking her. This won’t end well. “As a matter of fact,” he leans, rests on his desk, right in front of her, loving his height difference and accentuating it by standing while she sits, a reminder to both of them that he’s superior. Y/n wants to melt into a puddle on the floor, never to be seen again. “I hear that Smith, your test subject… he has almost already recovered.”

Referring, of course, to the poor boy whom they snatched and have provided her as a sick guinea pig, a way for her to test the torture chair they have forced her to make. It’s a requirement, of course, that she tests it on him herself.

“Sir, I don’t think-“

“DON’T LIE TO ME!” In the flash of a blink, he’s pulled a knife from his belt and he’s pushing her back in her seat, by pressing his blade on her throat. “You know what HAPPENS,” a tilt of his head, “when you LIE.” Friedrich is joined by Brigitta, as well as the echo of Müller’s voice, and Y/n’s heartbeat accelerates, her breath is caught in her throat. She feels like her ears are about to burst.

“He was unconscious when-“

“What did I just say?” Lips purse, scared of making any sound that’ll piss him off further. “Seems to me like you’ve forgotten,” he murmurs, flicking his knife shut and narrowing his eyes. He takes a deep breath, straightens up and she doesn’t dare to move an inch, but it feels like her heart has plummeted to the center of the earth, and she wishes it could drag her too, as far away from this as possible. She’s well aware of what’s to come.

A chilling half hour later she finds herself sucking up tears that’ll only make her situation worse if someone were to see them. The cold, plastic, remote controller is in her hands, and it’s heavy as it’s ever been. She deems herself desensitized of the emotional toll forcefully inflicting torture on innocent people used to take. However, nothing,  _ nothing _ , could possibly prepare her for what it feels like watching two HYDRA soldiers dragging her bleeding, thrashing brother from his armpits, and forcefully shoving him into the chair Y/n’s made. Director Müller watches her press the appropriate buttons with a sickly smile on his face.

She begs. For the first time in years, she begs God, the universe,  _ something,  _ to save her, to make her disappear. When this doesn’t work, when pleading for somebody to take mercy goes unheard, when the remote feels like the heaviest thing she’s ever lifted, her eyes draw to Müller, who’s watching her intently, waiting for her to carry on with her new assignment.

The millimeters her thumb has to cross feel endless. The process takes eons. The button is nearly unmoving.

Y/n will never forget her brother’s screams.

~~

In the hours that follow, she’s trapped inside her chamber, a tiny room of blank four walls with a hard bed and an open toilet, looking more like a prison cell than anything, the only difference being that in the daytime she’s allowed to come and go as she pleases within the unrestricted areas.

Tears streak her cheeks for yet another night, and the despair has never felt like this before. She thought she’d escape it one day, the guilt, the weight, but it seems she’s trapped, like an ant under a boot, seconds before she bursts to pieces, with the pressure of the entire world on her chest.

The itch grows louder. It’s right there, in the bottom of her heart, something to pay attention to, in her state of absolute isolation and despair. She’s alone, has  _ been _ alone for so many years, and she wonders, still, why she hasn’t killed herself yet, but the idea that if she does, they’ll probably also kill her brother comes and slaps her in the face. However, what else is there to do? How much torture can she make her brother go through because of her mistakes, how much guilt can she shoulder?

She sits on the bed, counts the bolts that are screwing the vent door on the ceiling, listens to footsteps pass by every so often, and ponders. Silent tears crawl down the curves of her face. She’s lost so much. She hasn’t spoken her native language in years, and sometimes she wonders if she’s forgotten how to.

A pair of heavy duty boots leisurely walk down the hallway, and she recognizes the voices of two guards. Conversation easily flows between them, and Y/n has no choice but to listen.

“ _ Did you hear about the new chair the American has made?” _ one of them says. Her ears perk.

_ “The American? No, what about it?” _

_ “They say it’s one of the most painful things they’ve ever used in HYDRA.”  _ Y/n winces.

_ “Are you serious?” _

_ “It’s what I heard. Wouldn’t wanna find out myself.” _ The soldiers share a chuckle.  _ “Müller made the American do it on her brother. I hear he died about twenty minutes later.” _

Y/n’s heart drops.

He- he’s- he’s dead?

_ “No kidding. The bastard survived six years. ‘S a wonder he’s lived this long”  _ And as the soldiers pass by, Y/n’s left in her chamber. The silence grows deafening, but the echo of her heart splitting and falling apart, shattering on the hard concrete floor is ear-splittingly loud. All that she’s done, all the sacrifices, all the sheer, iron will she’s had to muster to maintain her sanity, all the awful things she’s done, the blood on her hands, the guilt, the pain she’s caused and- and in the end… he died by her own hand.

Chaos and confusion, an ocean of lashing thoughts violently crashing and pulling her under. It feels like the crescendo of the longest song that’s ever been written, six years of constant playing, and the orchestra’s hands are bleeding on the strings and buttons, coating everything with their own pain, worked down to the bone, and this is it- the minutes before it’s finally over. The roof is about to be blown off its hinges.

The itch is no longer underlying. It consumes her, and she knows, finally. She recognizes it. Escapism. Revenge.

~

Steve’s silent. He hasn’t looked away from her, hasn’t changed stance, still with his arms crossed over his chest and bulging underneath his dark green sweater. He’s staring at her, patiently as ever, with a set to his jaw that she knows isn’t there out of anger, but because he, too, is overwhelmed with emotion. His shoulders are no longer stiff, and he now has a cup of coffee too, finished in front of him. The bags under both their eyes are darker. 

“I didn’t get to kill Müller. But I managed to run away. Barely. I disappeared, travelled to the States. I found Fury and sold all the information I knew about HYDRA and the department I had been held in, in return for protection. Fury took me in.” It’s a lifeless shrug, weighted and tired, and it’s then that Steve glances at his feet, then back at her. “I trained, learned how to fight properly. Used my knowledge for good. Made it to the Avengers in a desperate attempt to make up for all that I had done. ‘S when I met you.”

Steve seems to remember. He recognizes himself entering the story. It’s almost like he’s reliving the time they first met, back on that Helicarrier. A good memory, all things considered.

“There’s little excuse for me lying to you. I know. But please, you have to understand. The burden of getting to know the best friend of the person you’d been forced to help torture for years… becoming close friends with you? How could I ever say anything about anything and have you actually trust me?” She shook her head.

“What do you mean…?”

“They forced me to make weapons, new torture methods, even tried to make me refine Zola’s formula. A way to get a better grip on Bucky’s mind. I didn’t know much about all of it, nor who it was for, wasn’t my field anyways, and Zola’s formula was successful as it was, there wasn’t much for me to add. They later left me to the torture part, not the brainwashing. Even if I had known, though, I wouldn’t really have had a choice in the matter. I did anything I had to do to protect the only family I had left.” He nods seriously.

“We grew closer and closer and I wanted to tell you, to share my guilt with someone finally, but… the prospect of losing you was… too much. I didn’t want to lose the person that had reminded me for the first time in decades what it was like to be cared for. You were-“ a gulp “ _ are  _ like a brother to me.” Steve looks down. “I couldn’t see the betrayal on your face. It- it paralyzed me.

“I didn’t think you’d ever find out, honestly, how was I supposed to know you’d find my file? But don’t think I never felt guilty. It was always there, like everything could crumble at any moment, like a cloud looming over my head, but… I guess I kind of learnt to ignore it. I had found a family, Steve. After years of pain, pain received and pain caused, after so much darkness, I had finally found people who understood what guilt felt like, what it meant to be composed on surface level. I found people that loved me for what I was then and there. The idea of losing that crushed me.

“I know I can’t take it back, but for whatever it’s worth, I’m sorry. I’m so sorry Steve.” 

Steve stays tight-lipped, pondering, staring at the table, then at her, then at the table again. He’s carefully controlling his expressions, clearly analyzing the information he’s been given, and she holds her breath. Whatever his reaction is, she thinks, nothing compares to the breath of fresh air she can allow herself to take, free of this awful, lengthy story. Finally, clear honesty, a sort of vulnerability with her best friend that’s different and  _ new _ . True, down to its core.

It’s the sigh that does it for her. Resigned. Her eyes snap up at him. “You should’ve told me” He shuts his eyes and pinches the bridge of his nose before looking up at her, and shaking his head. “I would’ve understood. Nothing would’ve changed.” He looks right at her, very much like a discouraged parent. “What am I gonna do with you?”

And it’s- it’s the way he says it, as if everything makes sense now, shoulders dropping all the way down. The way he just- like he says  _ you absolute moron _ , but in their own, loving, sibling-like way. As if he can’t stay mad for too long. Looking at her with the tiniest sympathetic curl of his lip.

It’s relief, because it’s in that half a smile that she sees it all. She sees the forgiveness, the understanding. She sees the love. It’s as if he’s looking at her, saying  _ family, am I right? _ Despite her situation, for the first time in years, so, so many years, she breathes deeply, breathes oxygen that feels nurturing to her lungs, that makes her think she’s floating, and smiles, apologetically, trying to telepathically communicate  _ I’m sorry for being an idiot. Sorry for not trusting you. Sorry for fucking up this badly. I promise to be better. _

She knows, he’ll always be there to give her another chance.

~

It’s moments, a handful of them, in which time and space seem to stop existing, to warp into something else entirely, a world that’s so confused, nobody knows how to put it back. It seems, in those moments, one forgets where they are, how they got there, their brain has not yet escaped from the liquefied dreamland it’s manifested, can’t seem to fit in the strict, square rigidness of reality.

Bucky finds himself in that place. His eyelids seem to weigh about twelve tons, barely feeling his fingertips. It takes a great deal of effort to have thoughts, to- to maintain them, and as his mind slowly starts running a little faster, he remembers faintly, cloudy memories barely registering, that the last thing he saw was three soldiers, that had sneaked up on him, he remembers the gun being aimed at him, instinctively moving and getting nailed in the stomach multiple times.

Wherever he is now, it’s quiet. He worries for a second that he’s been left for dead in the HYDRA base, worries that he’s either dying on the floor or a vague prison cell, resembling something he’s been in already, but he’s comforted by the fact that the surface he’s on seems soft, the lights behind his eyes bright. Whatever the case, he should wake up now, he might need to get up and defend himself.

And as his eyes open, heavy and tired, he meets another pair of gorgeous ones, familiar and soft, and he feels warm all over. He’s- he’s safe. He’s safe because she’s here, and he loves her, with all of his being he loves her, and she’s holding his right hand close to her chest, he feels everything, her warmth, and he knows it’ll all be okay, it’ll all fix itself. He doesn’t have to try.

There’s something lingering just beneath his skin though, a need to recoil. Like a small bucket of icy water thrown over him, because, yes, he loves her, but she betrayed him. She could be out to get him right now, could be working with HYDRA still, and he might be trapped somewhere, and his heartbeat accelerates, because he has to escape and he can’t  _ trust her _ anymore- until he sees the tears. The tears streaking her cheeks, over old salty marks, and a smile, broken but whole. This isn’t the behavior of a captor, he decides, deems himself, if not safe, then entirely incapable of fighting back, should he need to anyways. Why worry now? Let his future self do the work.

His eyes move around the room, blue-ish gray walls vaguely familiar, and- there’s another figure, another pair of eyes- blue, happy. It’s Steve.

Bucky feels safe. He knows he’s alive. He knows he’s home.

~

Like any other free afternoon, Y/n finds herself on her couch, curled up as much as she can with a book in her lap. There’s a short lamp on the side table, and she leans on the armrest comfortably with her toes curled, flying through pages and pages of words. Her hair is down, she wears comfortable clothes, and has a blanket over her legs. The weather’s been getting colder lately.

A warm sound, four soft knocks on her wooden door, are enough to pull her out of her novel, enough to make her eyebrows stitch together. She’s not expecting anyone.

Her feet are bare and she’s well aware of how close her knives are to the front door, just in case she has to fling herself over and grab one. She presses her eye against the little peephole, but it’s old and foggy and the workers who had once repainted the building managed to cover part of it with small drops of paint and she hasn’t gotten around to trying cleaning it. Doorknob cold under her palm, she tilts and-

_ Oh _ .

The first thing she notices is his shirt, a maroon Henley, buried under two more layers of clothes, a brown hoodie and a darker brown leather winter jacket. The buttons on the collar of his Henley are open, giving her a cheeky peak of the skin of his chest. She loves this shirt on him. It feels like someone tugged at her heart from every direction.  _ Longing. _

The second thing she notices is that this- it’s Bucky. Bucky standing in front of her door with an expression she’s rarely, if ever, seen on his face before. Her favorite, gorgeous light blue eyes staring straight at her after briefly scanning her down, as if he, too, is making sure she’s actually there. She is. And so is he. Here. Now. In front of her. Looking at her. Her feet are on the floor, she’s not dreaming, the world is round and Bucky is here.

Oh God. He’s really at her door.

“James…”

He seems to shiver. A shake of his head, something she recognizes as him convincing himself this is happening, then eyes meeting hers again. He shoves his hands deeper in his pockets. She holds the door less tensely.

“I think…” squeezing his eyes shut for a moment, looking at the floor. “Steve said to talk to you.” A heavy breath. Shoulders awkwardly, tensely shrugging, sorta like a kid forced to apologize by their parent. She doesn’t know how, but her head manages a nod, gulping. She pulls away from the doorframe, makes way for him to pass.

“Come in.”

New York sounds as alive as it ever does, even at eleven at night, and Y/n wishes she was sitting, because her legs are unsteady. It makes tears well in her eyes, seeing him here again, in her kitchen, looking around absently. The world feels different, much like it did in the Compound when she’d gone to visit him, even if nothing has changed in it apart from them.

Despite the passing cars outside, and people yelling, heard through the open window, it  _ feels _ quiet. As if they’re the only ones in the world, being here with him feels like a  _ cosmic  _ event. She remembers what it was like sitting here and being so overwhelmed by the love in her heart, remembers what it was like to be surrounded by his arms and held so impossibly close to his chest. She remembers what it was like to look in his eyes and see them so affectionately looking at her, as if she’s everything he could ever ask for, as if she’s the light in his world. The cold of the night and of the space between them feels very much like a slap in the face.

“I know you no longer work for them,” and it truly breaks her heart how part of that statement feels like he’s trying to convince himself, or as if it’s difficult for him to process. How awful, the shift between being someone’s favorite person and being someone who’s trustworthiness is little over questionable. The weight of being responsible for fucking up the most important relationships in her life suffocates her. “Steve told me.” 

There’s nothing to do but nod numbly. She looks at him, watches the warm, glimmering lights of her kitchen fall on the curves and edges of his face, admires the yellow-ish hue outlining his features, making his eyes look iridescent.

She mustn’t cry.

“He told me everything, actually.”

She must  _ not  _ cry.

Bucky doesn’t say a lot of words, but they’re there, at the tip of his tongue, floating in the air like dust particles. In this, there’s a lingering question, a large  _ Why _ .  _ Why _ didn’t  _ you _ say anything?  _ Why _ did you hide all this from me? Why did it have to be this way?

Y/n looks down. What to say, really?

“I just- I can’t believe-“ she jumps at his loud tone, Bucky never one to have vocal outbursts. She sees the tears in his eyes, gaze lingering away from her, towards the living room for a second before looking up at the ceiling momentarily, then straight at her. His hands are shaking, and she sees it all then. The betrayal, the hurt, despair, the- the  _ loss.  _ There’s no alleviating this pain that overwhelms both of them. She  _ hates  _ herself for this, can’t believe she caused all of it.

“I- I did what I thought would be best for us-“

“No, don’t pull that shit with me.” He glares now and points at her, and she never,  _ ever _ wanted to be in the receiving end of such an intimidating look. Venom is laced in his tone, harsh and biting, and it feels like the temperature in the room dropped below zero, her spine rigid. “You did what you thought was best for  _ you _ ,” said as calmly as the tears that slowly leak from the corners of his eyes and over the apples of his cheeks are. “In fact, I doubt you  _ thought _ at all”

That’s not  _ true _ though. The amount of times she’d sit in her bed, with his arms around her while he slept, weighed down by the lies and the guilt; the guilt of all the terrible things she’d done, and the guilt of hiding them from the most important people in her life. She’d scale the pros and cons of confessing everything, for hours she’d make lists in her head, extensively long, but the cons were always destructively larger and would always win. She’d choose to stay as she was, with them oblivious and happy, until they would finally see her for what she truly was, and she’d convince herself, it would all be worth it for the time spent with them.

“I couldn’t tell you- I couldn’t face the idea of losing you I-“

“So you’d rather lie to me? You’d rather hide your past from me? I  _ trusted you,  _ Y/n.” He hasn’t called her by her first name in so long, and it feels like he just took one of her knives on her kitchen counter and stabbed her straight in her chest with it. “I gave you all of me, I told you every single little thing about myself, everything I hated, everything I’ve done, and I  _ trusted _ you to have it and- and you couldn’t even trust me to listen to you? To- to understand you?”

She deserves this, she does, but she can’t- can’t deal with him yelling at her and, reflexively, she lashes out- “I was  _ scared _ , Buck,” –and it’s a pitiful excuse, she knows, but it’s the bitter truth and the reason behind everything. “You have to understand- this isn’t some black and white situation, I thought you’d hate me for everything, I didn’t wanna lose you, or Steve!”

“ _ Scared? _ ” he seethes, walking towards her with angry steps, and she starts stepping back too, entering the living room. She realizes how large he looks, how his anger fills every corner of the room. “You were  _ scared _ ?!” She can practically taste the condescension on her tongue. “And you think I wasn’t?! You think I wasn’t paralyzed you’d run away after everything I’d done? You think I wasn’t terrified of my feelings for you and how fast they came to be?” She wishes she could answer that, but part of her is terrified to know what he used to feel for her and how much of it she actually ruined.

“But I’m a fucking adult, and I dealt with it. You… you lied about  _ everything _ . Did you even give a shit about how badly you were gonna fuck me over, if I ever found out?”

“Does it look like I fucking  _ like _ it? You  _ know _ how sorry I am, how much I hate myself for everything I’ve done to ruin both yours and Steve’s trust in me!”

“I don’t know  _ shit _ ,” her legs bump on the back of her navy couch. “You hurt me- hurt  _ us _ . We gave you everything, I put my heart on the line for you, and you couldn’t even have a little faith in me to believe in you, and what you truly are.”  _ A monster _ rings in Y/n’s brain.  _ Nothing but a monster. _

“Please, stop.” Submission. That’s all she has left, by now, because his words ring nothing but true. Because she can’t bear to hear everything she feels about herself being told back to her in his voice, it would literally be a nightmare come true. Everything drains in her body, and it all comes down to this. She just wants all of this to stop, the pain in  _ both _ of them to stop.

“No,” he hisses, and she can’t really blame him. He’s close to her, about two feet away, and she’s trapped between him and the couch. “I’m not gonna stop just because things got uncomfortable for you, just because you had to come back because I was dying in a gurney. You barely tried to make everything right before that. Do you even care?”

“Don’t you see that I did everything because I love you?!”

Silence. Bucky nearly staggers back, as if the words that have never, before, been said came out and punched him in the face.

“Why the fuck do you think I didn’t tell you anything? Because I wanted to break your heart? No, you clueless asshole, I’m in fucking love with you!” His expression is stunned, eyes wide at her outburst, watching as she takes the steps she needs to close the gap between them. Her finger is jabbing at his chest, which is raising and falling with panted breaths. “I couldn’t stand the thought of losing you, couldn’t take to watch your trust break, couldn’t  _ bear _ the thought of you finally seeing I’m a monster!” And she breaks down, a sobbing mess now, the tears that once trailed down her face, now endless. She covers her mouth, face crumpled and red.

“I j-j-just wanted us t-to be okay, bec-cause I love you t-too much to fuck-king lose y-you”, As her eyes shut, crying relentlessly in her hand, throat feeling like it’s gonna burst, she feels so eternally cold, as if showered by a bucket of icy water. The idea that she might once again be left alone in the world while someone she loves is taken away, all because of her actions- it’s too much. It takes her back to the worst day of her life, brings back a kind of cold so furious, it knots her joints and sends shudders down her spine- her hands tremble at the thought. She can’t believe how colossally she’s managed to screw things up with him, how much he hates her and genuinely believes she did anything less than care about him. .

Like a tidal wave, the emotions overwhelm her, the self-hate like a boulder that smacked her in the face and threw her down a cliff and now everything hurts, and her stomach feels like it’s climbing up her throat. Her heart tears through her chest, painful and slow, and it’s all her fault,  _ everything _ , and there’s nothing there to fix it all, to make it better- except, all of a sudden, warm, strong arms curl around her. She breaks down harder, curling in his chest because she fucking missed this, missed his affection, his protective embrace, his comforting smell.

Fists clutching his shirt, she sobs, acutely aware of her tears wetting the material of that maroon Henley she loves so much. The arms around her curl tighter, one hand dipping under her hair to hold the nape of her neck gingerly, keeping her against him, thumb rubbing gentle circles. And it’s then that she hears it, his own sniffling, his chest shaking. He’s crying too. The need to provide the comfort she seeks is overwhelming, and she lets his shirt go, wrapping her arms around his waist and holding him together too. “I’m so sorry,” she cries, shoulders shaking, and Bucky shushes her, shaking his head slightly. His arms tighten briefly.

In her crying, she vaguely registers him moving them to the couch, both sitting down, and her curling up into him instinctively. For a while, until she calms down slightly, she lets herself be held and holds him back just as fiercely. It feels like she’s finally letting go, an outburst that frees her of part of the weight she’d been shouldering for years on end. It feels like release, a dam that broke and is spilling every last drop of water that’s been pushing at it for so long.

When she quiets down, when her sobs no longer hurt, no longer feel like they’ll split her ribcage to splinters, when her breathing sort of evens out, she pulls one of her hands to rest on Bucky’s chest, and pulls away to look at him. Bucky’s arms tighten to keep her close.

She’s well aware she must look like a mess, what with all the crying, but this is  _ Bucky _ after all, her James, the love of her life. He’s seen her under all kinds of light now, and there’s no need to hide. Like he wants, if he is to care for her, after all this, he should care for her for all the things she is, not the things she pretends to be.

Bucky’s eyes are a little less bloodshot than hers. She cups his chin gently and watches his eyelashes flutter, his eyelids softly shut. With her thumb she gently strokes his cheek and notices the way he seems to lean into her palm, lips parting with heavy breaths. He missed her too.

He opens his eyes again to look at her and leans his forehead down to touch hers, holds her closely and brushes the tip of his nose on the bridge of hers so lightly she almost misses it. She sighs. “You have every right to be angry at me,” she whispers to him, pulling her hand back and tucking it in her chest. “I lied, and I didn’t trust you, and I acted the complete opposite way of how I should have. For all of that,” a breath sucked, almost clogged at the center of her chest, “for all of that, I’m sorry.”

Bucky, still infinitely close to her, shakes his head gently. He takes one arm from around her, and she thinks this is it; this is where he says goodbye-

But, gentle as always, he places his right hand on the side of her neck, softly nudges her head up to his and drops his lips on her own, a ghost of a kiss, short and unexpected, before he pulls back and looks at her. “I love you.” He whispers, breath hitting her lips, and her eyes well with tears once again, as she looks up at him. She never thought she’d hear those words, not after everything. Bucky kisses her single fallen tear away, noses at her temple.

“I don’t think you’re a monster, the same way you didn’t think I am one. You helped me heal, helped me learn that those things I did, they weren’t me. I didn’t have a choice.”

“B-but-“

“No, you listen to me.” He tells her, his grip around her body tightening, giving emphasis to his words. “You did what you had to do to protect your brother. What you did… The blood isn’t on your hands.” He has not let her gaze go for a second, and she’s transfixed, tears still overflowing- she wonders when she’ll finally run out of them. “I love you.” Her bottom lip trembles. “I love you more than I thought I was ever capable of. Thinking you betrayed me completely incapacitated me, but I understand you. I see you. I forgive you.”

She gasps, shudders, and in the spur of a single waking moment, lunges at him, kisses him fiercely, holds him tightly. Their lips mold together, and the last pieces of the universal puzzle of the cosmos click to place. Everything settles, mouths moving in sync, desperate, hungry, all the emotions tumbling out all at once, and it’s like the slingshot snapped, and the missile hit the target. She bites his bottom lip, and the groan he lets out comes from deep within his chest, tongues tangling together. His metal arm crushes her against him, hand buries in his hair, their noses smush together, breaths strangled, air shared, and…This- this feels like belonging. No- more like, this feels like coming home.

Inevitably, they part, trying to suck in much needed air, foreheads knocking together gently and chests heaving. It seems like they feed off each other’s personal space, like they hold each other in one piece, while also completing one another. To Y/n it feels like a breath of fresh air.

“This doesn’t mean we’re perfect yet,” Bucky utters gently, not in a menacing way, but as a soft clarification, a request even. “I- I’m gonna need some time.” She’s grateful he even chose to give her a chance at all. Y/n smiles up at him affectionately and nods.

“Of course, Buck. All the time you need.” She caresses the side of his face with gentle fingers, traces his features with a feather-light touch, then cups his jaw. “Thank you.” And it’s weighted, hangs low in the air. She looks at him intensely to make sure he knows she means it. Bucky closes his eyes and leans into her touch, then blinks them open, brilliant, sky blue irises staring right at her. “I love you so much.” He breathes out heavily.

“Say that again,” he whispers. She grins at him as if he’s all good things in the world, because he is.

“I love you, Sergeant Barnes.” A kiss pressed to his cheek. “I love you with all of my being.” A kiss gently tucked on each of his eyelids. “I love you for all that you are.” And she kisses him on his lips sweetly, and he responds like she’s made out of glass, like she’s fragile. He sighs out. They breathe close to each other for a while.

“I know you said you need some time. Do you… wanna go out with me? Coffee? At Michelle’s?” Bucky grins. Their spot. He nods.

“I’d really love that.”

It’s not much, but it’s something. An olive branch. The first step to gain his trust back. There’s nothing Y/n deems more important. With a deep breath, she knows. She’s ready to do anything, to work her hardest to earn a place in his life, the one he’s so graciously offered her. To get to build a future with him, on steady foundation this time.

Their life begins now. Y/n can’t wait to live it. With him.

  
  


**Author's Note:**

> Thank you for reading:) please please tell me what you thought!


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